The locale of Jesus’ first miracle is a party, a wedding, with wine at the center of the action. Scripture dares to place God’s abundance in a festive setting here, not a mountaintop vision or a sermon on the plain. The wedding at Cana invites the reader to expect God’s activity even in the details of raucous human celebrations that aren’t strictly “religious,” like a noisy wedding reception.

Momentous news penetrates the scene. Jesus declares a mission focused on a family much larger than his immediate one. He also makes it clear that his hour has not yet come. For the time being, he turns attention to the matter at hand—a lack of wine at a crucial moment in a teeming social occasion. He extravagantly transforms the six massive jugs of water into wine. It’s the good stuff, and it’s more than anyone needs—the modern equivalent of about nine hundred bottles.

It’s usually explained that these verses carry symbolic meaning about Jesus’ cosmic nature: The miracle is a symbol of God’s power, and the wine foreshadows the Last Supper and Easter drama to come. To me the force of Cana has much to do with the earthy details amid laughter, hospitality, and carousing. This story didn’t have to be told. It didn’t have to appear in a Gospel in order to make the case for Jesus’ unique relationship to God. Yet here he is, at leisure with his friends, the heavenly will of God bisecting the sweet traditions of a wedding.

I know people who feel alienated from religion because they think the Christian message is judgmental or joyless. I hope they’ll take another look at the Gospel of John and crash the wedding at Cana.